Tuesday, 4 July 2017

Resistance may not be futile. Idles @ Rough Trade, Cabbage @The Scala

Two shows separated by two weeks. Two bands drawing on
differing genres as their starting point yet finding common cause in their
expression. Two moments that suggest reports of the demise of guitar music may
be, as is often the case, somewhat premature.

Rough Trade East for Idles. A band that have been talked
about in ever increasing circles since people got wind of their ‘Brutalism’
album. Built on US Hardcore and post rock dynamics yet shot through with a
palpably English expression, their run through the album tracks in a record
shop transcends the usual ‘meh-ness’ of an instore and becomes a rallying
point, an out-poring of communal disgust at the system as represented by
Grenfell, DUP bribes and public sector slash and burn.

If that sounds less than entertaining know this. These
volleys of lyrical subversion, these tales of horror on the breadline, of the sheer
mental stress of trying to live in a society that divides to conquer are
presented with a showmanship that echoes The Blockheads and flirts, in
guitarist Mark Bowen, with the ghost of early 70's Roxy Music. Between the
songs, sharp, clever bursts of intricate noise that go way above and beyond the
reductive idea of ‘punk’, singer Joe Talbot contextualises and humanises these
tales of anger and spite and, most of all, resistance, with off-hand remarks
and explanations that are by turns revealing and touching.

A fortnight later, to the current zeitgeist accompaniment of
‘Oh, Jeremy Corbyn’; the modern equivalent of the CND pin badge in the 80s,
Cabbage land at the Scala. The vein is similar, the base different. A more
English post punk augmented by the likes of Dead Kennedy’s cartoon bile is in
play yet that is too reductive. The Blockheads spring to mind once more, as
does the angularity of The Fall (in both bands), a sardonic yet pinpoint series
of revelations that skewer the sheer awfulness of the society we have created
and currently ‘enjoy’. The whole could be dry and hectoring yet Cabbage and
Idles are here to celebrate with their community, not lecture them. Stage divers
are present at both, a phenomenon until recently reduced to sub genres of rock
yet now breaking out as an expression of freedoms and the lack of band / audience
barriers.

Cabbage nail the DUP deal with the appearance of the ‘ghost of Ian
Paisley’, beamed in from the 70’s in beige lounge suit to goad the crowd for
the finale of ‘Uber Capitalist Death Trade’, a track that suggested guitars
might again be wielded to political statement to create a (potentially) mass
audience once more. The ghost of English theatre subversion all the way back to
Shakespeare’s mechanicals hovers over the Scala stage.

There is joy in both performances. Joy in the sense that
here are artists that are ready to communicate meaning in ways that are
inclusive and accessible. That guitar bands can find new ways to take old
formats and ideas and reinvent them to carry new and important messages. That
shows can once again be a coming together of more than a group of people
wanting to sing along to a clutch of hit singles before going back to their
conveyor belt in the morning. That music can change minds and make a
difference. The audience at both shows exit talking about their night but also
the relevance of that to the wider world outside the venue doors.

It’s a long
way from a chant to real change but here are two moments that suggest guitar
bands may again play a part in the process to come.